Back on the Saddle

It's been nearly a year since Cask Theology released it's last video, the latest in the Beer History series. I made a quip that I hoped the next video wouldn't take as long as the last one. Well, Foot, say Hello to Mouth. 

When I was deeply into creating videos for the channel, I came across a statistic that said most channels die out after 5 years. Indeed, many of my peers from those early years ago have met that fate. I thought it would never happen to CT. But then, life is full of twists and turns and my particular twist came in the form of getting a pub management position. It could be said it was my dream job, to run my own countryside pub. Ah, such good times. 

But this would also be the spear in CT's side. Previously I'd made videos in between shifts at my full time job, but when I became manager, well the demands on my time increased from about 35-40 hours a week to well... 60 to 70ish. I used to joke that there was a problem with the pub. It was my problem. This of course, doesn't leave a lot of time to make a video.

When it all collapsed, I found myself in quite the opposite situation to any I'd been in for the last 20 or so years. I'd gone from all of the hours to none, with plenty of time to catch up on well.. anything. But bills don't pay themselves and so it wasn't long before I was putting myself back out there, culminating in the position I currently hold. I've gone from the top to well, the bottom rung.

It was during those early days my wife and I discussed what we should do going forward, and we eventually settled on a plan. Yes, I'd lost my job and our home with it, but the position we had now found ourselves in was not exactly terrible. I was convinced to do something I wasn't really good at. To not chase the Next Thing and just.. chill out for a bit. To take stock of the craziness that my life had been for a couple of years. To figure out what should come next. And so I did.

I mention all this because it does actually tie into my little Youtube channel. Amazingly, even without any input from me, it has grown. Not like, by thousands or anything, but people are still subbing to it. People are still looking at my silly nonsense. But here's the thing; although I still think about making videos, you actually have to y'know, make them. With my time of reflection done with, I find myself wanting to get creative more and more. With the arbitrary milestone of January 1st come and gone, I have decided to re-embrace an old hobby of mine. It's time to get the Cask Theology horse out of the stable and saddle up.

It all begins with this post. Something I've realised about making videos, like with a lot of things really, is that you have to make a habit of it. I've opened this laptop a hundred times over the last year but never gotten as far as doing anything. Except maybe getting distracted. Writing this is the first step. Heck, it's taken me three days to put finger to keyboard properly.  But I intend to reclaim what I once had- a small channel with a loyal following that actually paid me every now and then. In my reflections I realised that I made videos for 6 years because I enjoyed doing it.

Cask Theology is about to be Born Again. Hopefully, better this time. I've got plenty of ideas about a slight rebranding and a mental list of the new videos I want to make. I'm going to scan through all my analytics and see if they're a good fit. I think they might be. That said, there is a spectre that hangs over the channel in the form of the video series that I had left behind, notably History of Beer and Apostolic Fathers. I think I owe it to both my viewers and myself to close those out properly. That said, it's been a looong time and I've got to retrace a lot of steps, particularly when it comes to Beer History. I'm going to have to re-read a fair amount. But Challenge Accepted. 

Well, would you look at that, an entire blog post. A bit waffley but I hope it goes some way into explaining my mindset as I place my first boot in the stirrup. I'm giving myself a tentative goal of releasing a long form video in March, but given how psyched I am just having written this, that might be way too late an estimate!

 Anyways, if you're a loyal fan that saw this thing, thank you for your support during my absence. It's wild so many have stuck around. Thanks for waiting. Thanks for watching. And thanks for seeing where this will go.

See you all soon.

- Matt

 

I Have A Pub!

 

This isn't my place. It's just a generic pub image I nabbed online.

 

    Well, hello there!

    I know I've been a bit on the quiet side lately on my socials, including Youtube, Twitter and so on. I hinted that there was a big announcement to come a while back, and now the dust has somewhat settled and the things have been signed, I am now able to confidently say what's been going on. You saw the title.

                                                                           I Have A Pub!

    That's right, after many years of working behind the bar of a pub, I now have one to run of my own- as the manager. So yeah, I don't own the the place, but I'm now the guy in charge of it. For full disclosure, I'd been helping to manage pubs for most of my 20 odd year career- but I was third in line to the throne, so to speak. With my (now) former company, I had tried to ascend the greasy pole at least four times- each time ending in disaster and dissapointment. 

    You see, there are great advantages to working in a Big Pub Company when it comes to maintainence, beer supply, legal stuff getting covered and so on and so forth. But the flipside is that you don't get a say in a lot of things either. And because PubCos are overseeing business in the thousands, you tend to get lost in the shuffle. Anyone who has worked a big corporate gig will tell you the same. The Higher Ups tell you to jump, and you HAVE to. 

    Now when the Covid Pandemic hit, and I got furloughed for months, I instintively knew that The Shareholders would want that money back somehow. I knew that the Pandemic was Crap, but what would follow would be equally so. I was not wrong.

    You see, as much as they like to paint a picture of how caring and wholesome and cool and groovy they are, a PubCo exists for one reason- to make money. And the big ones with shareholers really care about that. I knew they'd want that furlough money back. I knew they'd start to employ some Big Brother Crap to claw those costs back. And sure enough, they did.

    This leads me to this year, 2023. The company I worked for had in essence, lost it's soul. When I joined it in 2015, it had a brand vision that I could get on board with. It was a great mix of the corporate and the spirit of Pubs of Old. We were "A Pub That Did Food". A local watering hole that was aimed at a certain demographic I was now part of- the sort of person who has moved on from the partying of their youth and prefers a calm place to do their boozing. But it was still a Local Pub- something I can't really explain to those outside of UK Pub Culture. Apologies to my American readers.

    After Covid though, this all changed. It was a slow change, but I noticed it. A subtle shift in policy. Lots of little decisions led me to the point where I was getting fed up with corporate heavy handedness. My pub began to lose it's soul, and my heart wasn't in it any more. It wasn't the people I worked with, it wasn't the job per se, but being there felt like a slog. I wasn't even part of the upper management, but I could see the pressures put on my peers to do things which now I'm out of that game I can see as just pointless busywork. 

    The thing that got me though, that final straw, was money. An obsession with Costs and Profit. I got why they made the decisions they did. I understood. But it didn't make it less crap. Saving money on labour became a massive focus, often to the detriment of service and the wellbeing of the team. But as I said, it was the money that got me. Christmas is a big deal for us in hospitality. For us barfolk, it means a big payday at the end of it, as you tend to get double time or something. But thanks to the cuts in labour hours, my post Christmas pay was less than a regular months worth.

    So naturally, I went looking for something else. I didn't expect what happened though. On one of the last days of my holiday, I cracked open a can of Jaipur DDH, expecting the only thing I'd get done that day would be ironing shirts for work. I happened across some notes I'd made with a number on it for a company looking for team. I figured I'd ring up and see if it interested me.

    Hours later, I was stood in what is now my bar, being offered the chance to run a pub of my own. I was presented with, let's be honest, a life changing decision. I asked for some time to mull it over. I rang up a couple of days later and asked a million questions. I asked for the advice of my peers. One of them told me that the decision was pretty much made in my mind. They were right. That night I phoned up and said yes.

 

Me on my first day as a Pub Landlord with an appropriately named pint of Landlord

    So, to today. I am now the General Manager of a small village pub in the English Countryside. It is a vastly different experience to what I'm used to, but here's the most important thing- I am loving being in hospitality again. I've had a lot of things to unlearn and habits to break from my many corporate years. One of the common phrases I'd say was "I just want to run my pub" and now I get to do just that. 

    Obviouly, there is the YouTube Question. What about that? Well, there's been a fair bit of disruption in my life as I transitioned from one job to another but the dust is slowly starting to settle. I haven't had a proper day off in about three weeks, but that's because I chose not to have them, and instead fix something in the pub. For instance, last week I spent the day sorting out my cellar, removing junk and getting it to a standard I was happy with. Silly things like that that once done, only need a small amonut of work.

Now a lot of these little jobs are done, I can afford myself some free time- which is why I'm posting this today. I actually have the chance at some time away from my business. This means of course that I can get back to writing and recording. One of my jobs, now I've worked out when my I have some free time, is to finish off the script for Beer History 1700's part two. If I get a chance, I might even record the audio for it. 

I'm hoping that once I get into my groove I'll be able to make regular content again. And well, let's be honest, now I have my own pub there is potential for loads of video ideas. I got interruped writing this to go help a member of team change a barrel. That's an idea right there.

I'd like to end this by thanking everyone for being patient. I know I've chucked out some cryptic tweets and such but I didn't want ot make this reveal until I knew everything was secure. So yep, that's it. That's my news. I run a pub now. Content is coming. But until then...

 

What can I get you?

The 2022 Roundup

 

 

Well, it's about that time again. The Festive Season is all over, the dust has settled and the New Year is in full swing. This time around I got stuck at work, which meant that my usual video that I churn out about this time of year proved impossible to make. So, I decided to do the next best thing. So without further ado, lets take a look at the highs and lows of 2022.

The Lows

Let's get all the negative stuff out of the way first. There weren't as many videos on the channel in 2022 as in previous years. In fact, I didn't even average one a month. There have been a few reasons for this, including social events, work schedules messing up my free time and so on, but the main reason is as simple as this: a lack of motivation. 

Now I'm not obsessed with The Numbers when it comes to Cask Theology as this is merely a hobby. But after a couple of missed deadlines I started to overthink things a bit, which inevitably led to the spark of making something dwindle. It felt a bit like I was paying a bill, not indulging myself in something I enjoy. I don't want to label it burnout, because I actually still enjoyed making the vids I did, but there seemed to be a sort of weight attatched to content creation. Once I got going, I really enjoyed the process, but it was just getting started that seemed to have become an issue. 

I don't want to promise any great sweeping changes or announce three times the content of last year or anything like that, but now that '22 is done with I do feel like I've turned a bit of a corner. Heck, even sat here typing away with my cup of tea is making me feel exited for making things, and part of the reason for this I'll mention a bit later.

The Highs

 

 

Right, let's chuck all that negative talk to one side. It's easy to get bummed out, but the good thing about the turn of the year is that it's a great time to stop and take stock of things. I thought that I would'nt have much to say about good things happening with the channel, given how I've been with content creation recently but guess what? I was wrong. By a lot.

2022 was actually a pretty good year for Cask Theology. At it's beginning I had managed to garner a total of 1540 subscribers, which was amazing. Allowed the use of ads and such. For total transparancy, I've only been payed by YouTube twice, the last time being in around October. To date I have made £160, so I doubt I'll be buying a yacht any time soon. 

One year later and I'm sitting at 2195 subs, which means I gained about as many as I did in 2021. I even did a celebratory "Dank Christian Memes 2" video. Let's hope this momentum continues into 2023, maybe even getting to 3k by this time next year. Hopefully by then I'll have shaken myself out of this funk I'm in. 

So in my last update video I outlined what I wanted to do, and well, I did some of it. I did indeed get out not one, but two Beer History videos, and three Church History ones. I also tried out being in front of the camera this year for a video about Shandygaff, which was actually a lot of fun to make. It's since got the cogs whirring for similar content I can make. Alas, the "Practical" videos I thought about never really came to fruition, but I did at least get to explain Alcohol Units.

The real highlight of 2022 came in the form of two chaps called Phil and Adam. They both host the Everybody's Dead Dave Podcast, which I had been thoroughly enjoying. I put myself forward as a potential guest for a certain episode and was thrilled to be invited on to talk about Red Dwarf and theology. I had an ace time, and the hosts, although tired from an evening of recording, were really nice dudes. They also make really good nerdy content. 

You can of course find the podcast on all good Podcasty places, my particular episode was called Lemons from season 10. To tie into it I created another pop culture religion episode all about Red Dwarf, which wowza, took off like a shot and currently sits at 1k views. 

It was bittersweet though, as the BBC slapped a copyright claim on it so that whole £1 revenue I made went to them. I'm not that fussed. I did use a lot of footage and images, wondering if Fair Use would cover it. Really enjoyed making that one. I hope 2023 brings with it some more collabs.

So What's Next?

 

Well, I guess it's time I laid out what I plan to do with things this year. Pondering it, one of the reasons I've been stuggling with making stuff is that I'm still covering the same topics I was over a year ago. It's one of the reasons I started making the pop culture videos, so I could cleanse my brain a bit.

That said though, I am determined to see the Apostolic Fathers and Beer History videos through to the end. But I am also aware that a bit of a shake up is needed, for my sake at least. Over Christmas I've been thinking about what that might look like, but for now I'm going to keep going with the videos I'm doing now.

After all, there aren't many Apostolic Fathers left to cover, and the Beer History videos are going to take longer to make now that we're heading into the Industrial Revolution, because a lot of stuff starts happening. 

Naturally, the videos will be Beer and Theology based, but I could do with a break from making mostly history videos. I've some ideas about doing Theology for Beginners, a series all about Pub Naming Conventions, videos on How To Pour a Beer, stuff like like that. I really could do with going to a pub and hashing them out over a pint or two.

So, that's 2022 all wrapped up. I hope to see you all soon! Until then, do go grab yourself a drink and keep asking questions.

-Matt

 

2000!

 This week has marked a new milestone for Cask Theology, as 2000 people have hit that big red subscribe button. It kind of snuck up on me as well, as I was aware that my subs were going up every month in little dribs and drabs, but I never really paid attention to the total amount. 

Over the weekend I happened to glance at my Youtube Studio app and saw that I was about to hit the big 2000, a fact I audibly exclaimed so my work colleague asked me if I was ok. I then decided I should do something to celebrate it, so I popped up a poll on my community tab. I figured I'd do either Dank Christian Memes Part Two or Something about beer, maybe r/bartenders. 

Today I've popped the poll on Twitter too, maybe get some interest. 

 But crikey, it's a strange feeling knowing that that many people think that my videos are worth a watch. I felt the same way when I hit 100 subs, and 1000. THAT many people want to listen to me waffle about my favourite things?

 I'm not going to lie, I've found content creation a bit tough recently. This isn't something like burnout or anything like that, I've been, in all honesty, not in a good place when it's come to motivation. Either for content creation or anything else for that matter. I won't get into the boring details here, but needless to say it's made a dent in my usually chill demeanor. 

 So when I look and see that one of the hobbies I have has bourne some fruit, I have to be honest, it did light up a spark in me. I'd had a fairly crap week, but here was one positive thing. And sometimes all you need is one positive thing to turn spark into flame, into fire, into blaze. This and a couple of other equally little positive things really make me feel like I'm starting to get my mojo back. 

I don't feel like I can take on the world, but I sure can feel myself getting back to normal. All because people I've never met have stopped by my little channel and decided that they were going to stick around. If you are one of those people, thank you. 

 So let's wrap this up. I've got a ton of video ideas for CT, and now that I'm starting to feel myself again, they might actually get off the page and into reality, because well, about a village worth of people are interested in what I have to say. So until then, go grab yourself a drink and we'll ask some questions.
 

A Beery Adventure

 

Another week, another opportunity to go somewhere and drink some lovely lovely beer. But this time around I was leaving my home far behind to set off on a long distance beery adventure.

This time around, I was setting off deepest darkest Birmingham to attend the "Summer Sesh", a meetup for any and all who enjoy the Beer O Clock Show Podcast. If you don't listen to it, and you have an interest in beer, then you really should give it a listen, especially if you want to know what's going on in the UK's Beer scene. 

I'd been an avid listener of the podcast for years now, and it's slowly become part of my commute to work. So when I discovered that the Summer Sesh was in Birmingham, my old stomping grounds, as well as the fact I had a day off.. the decision was made. Especially when I learned that my friends Bob and Sarah were going too, because if all else failed, I'd get to see them.

So the Friday arrived and I set off, back to whence I came. Two hours later I found myself in a place familiar but not, as the train station had been renovated. However me and Bob found each other quite easily thanks to the magic of phones and then we were off to the Colmore.

The Colmore.

The Colmore is a Thornbridge pub, the second I've been to over the years. Like the train station, it served to show me that a lot had changed in Brum since I left years ago. It's decor is similar to the other one I'd been to, The Market Cat in York, which meant lots of glass and bright wood. Here we opted for halves just to get things rolling. Bob went for Thornbridge's seminal classic Jaipur, whilst I decided to go for a half of Stingray, a tasty little collab with Neon Raptor.

If you're of a certain age you're probably humming a cetain tune when you see this beer on..

 

After nabbing a bite to eat, it was time for the main event, which was being held at the Glasshouse Brewery in Stirchley. Thankfully Bob and Sarah knew where it was, because it was so buried in an industrial estate I don't think I would have found it. 

Once there, introductions were made and we ventured in. Given the name of the event, my first beer was a nice little refreshing number called "Bringing Seshy Back". After trying a few I had landed on the one I'd stick with while I was there- a cracking Raspbery Ale simply called "Julie". I laughed with Bob about how all these beers would make my regulars turn up their nose, as they were all hazy. Generally when I see a hazy beer at my place, it's the end of the cask. It didn't matter to me that my beer was hazy and pink, it was the perfect brew for the glorious summer day we were sat in.

Julie.

 The converstaions began to flow along with the beer and the folks sat next to us had a ponderous look on their faces. Apparantly they knew me from somewhere. I recognised them too, but could not quite place it myself either. I asked if it might have been from one of the pubs I worked in when I lived in Brum, and the penny finally dropped- many years ago, I had been their Barman, at the start of their journey into beer! 

 After a little while Bob and Sarah had to go, but there was still more beer to be had. I spent some time saying hello to people, putting faces to Twitter handles and avatars. The sky seemed to change and we all thought it might be an idea to go inside- a wise move as it started to chuck it down. 

The rain didn't stay for long, and soon the hosts Steve and Martin announced it was time for the second venue on the itinerary- Attic Brew Co., which was a short walk away. Or it might not have been, but I'd had a few by then. Led by our guide Rob we soon arrived at the second of our venues, where I fancied a palate cleanser from all the raspberry and opted for a pint of lager, although the name of it escapes me. I probably went with my tried and tested method of chosing a new beer- pick the one with the silliest name.

At this point I don't really remember which beers I had in Attic as I was now a fair bit wobbly, but I can say I finished them all. I switched to halves again to find a winner, but alas, I had noticed it would soon be time for me to go. However just before I went, I heard a cry of "Barley Wine!" and suddenly I'd got some in my hand. 

I don't remember taking this.

 

My, what a fantastic day. I met some amazing people and got to try some really good beer. Thanks to Martin, Steve and Rob for setting this all up, I had an absolute blast. Plus I finally got to meet some folks I'd chatted with on Twitter, namely Rob and Johnny. I think next time I'll book the two days off because one didn't do it justice. All during my hungover Saturday shift I was wishing I was still there for round two, especially since I knew some of the pubs on the list that I would have loved to have visited again.

As for my journey home.. well that is a whole other tale that reads like a comedy sketch. Let's just say I missed my train and leave it at that for now. But as crap as that all was, The Summer Sesh was so much fun with such great people that's not the part I'll remember in the years to come. Beer People are good folks. There's only one way to sign off on this post I think.

Cheers!

 

Return of the Fest

 

This week, I did something very interesting. It was something I haven't been able to do for the last 2 and a bit years, thanks so a certain Pandemic that changed quite a lot of things. The last time I did this was in 2019, and I did not envision that it would be my last for a while. 

Come to think of it, 2019 upon reflection feels a lot like the opening chapters of HG Well's classic novel The War of The Worlds, where The Narrator describes what life was like before the Martians arrived:-

"It seems to me now almost incredibly wonderful that, with that swift fate hanging over us, men could go about their petty concerns as they did." (Chapter 1, The Eve of The War)

We didn't get invaded by Martians, but we might as well have been for what was to occur. In a few short months COVID-19 went from being some obscure outbreak in China to a Global event, and in a switch to the War of The Worlds analogy it was humanity getting it's butt kicked by a virus. 

In 2022 we all know how things went. Lockdowns, Masks, Social Distancing and in my case, actually getting infected and having to quarantine. But one thing it did make us all realise is some of the stuff we could do freely beforehand that we had taken for granted. 

 All that social stuff us humans did was taken from us in some way, and for me that something was the yearly CAMRA Beer Festival. It had become something of a tradition for me to attend, partially as a representative of my pub, and partially as an excuse to drink a lot of beer with friends. It was a yearly event, one I looked forward to, but for the last few years, with restrictions, they were rapidly becoming a fond memory.

 Enter 2022 and the Beer Festival was back. Slightly different as COVID has'nt completely been ruled out as a threat in the UK. But it was about 90% how it used to be and let me tell you, it felt good. It felt good to get a list of beers as long as my arm to chose from, to pass it to my friend and say things along the line of "cor, try that!" and have discussions about some interesting drinks with people like me who were into beer. 

Beer Nerdery is like many fandoms, but we call our coventions "festivals" instead. In a room with over 100 beers available as well as a selection of about 25 ciders you'd think the place would be full of drunkards and louts. The first part, yeah, by the end of the night there were a lot of wobbly people. But the thing that I love about beer festivals is that generally people are only there to get drunk by accident. We're mostly there to try as many different beers from as many breweries as we can to find our new favourite brew.

I must confess, when we left we were all very wobbly, but we had had a great night discussing the beers we liked, the ones we hated, the ones that were weird, good and bad. You get talking to the people around you and because beer is a social lubricant, and because we're there for all the same reason, you can talk about it with no judgement and get to nerd out about hops and breweries and the merits of your favoruite style.

We got talking to the group next to us who told us about the nights' standout beer- a beer called Blue Razz which, I kid you not, was described as a "Blue Raspberry Slushy Ale". Being on Key Keg, it tasted exactly like it sounded. Certainly the standout beer for me, although the stout infused with honycomb came a close second.

Here's me unsure about the whole thing. I mean, look at it!

Even better, the group got wind of a pastime I'm fond of- cycling to pubs. It turns out they didn't live very far away from me and even drew me a map of all the best pubs in the area. And this is one of the reasons I love going to these beer festivals, because like say, MCN or Comicon, you're all there because of a shared love, in this case beer. In fact, I've been to some cons over the years and the vibe is very similar, albeit a bit more raucous. 

I came away from it all realising a lot of stuff I've missed over the past few years, and that now things are pretty much as they were in 2019 it's made me want to revisit plans from back then. I'd planned to take Cask Theology into a more Live Action direction and show my face on camera, and visit various locations relevant to both Theology and Beer. I pondered that covering the festival would have made for a fantastic video, or livestream.

Plus, as I've realised, in the earlier days of the channel when I went for an "Ashens" style of presentation (Check out his channel and compare it to my earlier stuff and you'll see the link) I had a lot less editing to do. While I love editing and making the videos I do, it sure is time consuming. If sticking my mug on screen means I can teach about Theology and Beer quicker and easier then that's a sacrifice I think I'm willing to make. Especially as a lot of the ideas I have for future content will involve real life places, and with any visual media it's better to show, not tell.

So to conclude, yeah, I went to a Beer Festival. It was fun. If you like beer, or even if you're not sure, why not go to one? Try everything. I discovered some fantastic beers. I even tried some amazing ciders. Who knows? You might even find something you like, or have an ephiphany. Turns out that this time, I had both. Anyways, I have some script writing to do, so I'll see you all again soon.

 

A Channel About Theology And Beer... No, Really!

 

Why hello there! I'm not sure how you came acrross this little corner of the internet, but I'm glad you did. Welcome. My name is Matt and for Four years I've been making videos about Theology and Beer on Youtube.

You might be wondering why I'd pick two seemingly unrelated topics, since when you think of Beer you don't really think about Christianity. Well, years ago when I was pondering doing Youtube as a creative outlet, the phrases "Write About What You Know" and "Focus on a Specific Niche" got used by one of the many Youtube Gurus out there and well, I know about both.

I know about both because I have a degree in Theology and I've worked in the UK Pub Trade for 25 years. I realised that if you got me talking about one of these two subjects you couldn't shut me up, so I figured I'd unleash that knowledge onto the web and here we are 4 years and about 80 videos later.

Increasingly I've felt the need to have something external to my channel to vent out some stuff I've been pondering or indeed to have another place where people can find my channel, and well, here we are. I've been pondering expanding the scope of what Cask Theology is beyond Youtube, or having a place to plonk down my thoughts on things in a longer form format than my Twitter account will allow. There's also stuff that I've thought about discussing that doesn't quite fit into a video but does fit into say, a blog or something.

I've toyed with a few sites such as Wix, Squarespace and so on but If I'm honest, all of them seemed a bit too busy for me. Many, many years ago I blogged about Theology and Gaming, and created a place to view my cartoons, and for that I used this very platform, Blogger. If you're reading this, then I guess I was able to finally settle on a platform I liked.

One day, hopefully in the near future I might be able to turn making silly videos about Theology and Beer into my actual job, but until then I'm still enjoying the process of waffling into a microphone and making something that people might find interesting and spewing out stuff on my keyboard. Thanks for joining me on this odd little journey I'm on. Please feel free to visit my channel on Youtube and take a look, or I dunno.. wait until I finally updtae this thing.

In any case, grab yourself a drink, keep asking questions and I'll hopefully see you soon.